7 replies to this topic

[Lightfoot]

Just some feedback on current balance.

In all the past MechWarrior games Lasers are considered the easiest to aim and use weapons and even though MWO adds a duration, they are still just point and click weapons with some pretty easy cursor tracking. Projectiles and Missiles have a much greater chance to miss than Lasers.

Lasers are also the fastest, easiest, Light mech killers because they hit hard and don't miss the cursor point. So all that deflection defense the Light mechs get from speed and turning is mostly nullified by Lasers.

Currently MWO has reduced the accuracy and/or functionality of the other weapons (and long range weapons especially) so much, that nothing can compete with Lasers and that is unbalancing the core attribute dynamics of the four Mech Classes. Namely, Speed, Armor, and Payload. That is reasonably why the Light mech usage was the lowest ever (prior to the Urbie release), and the Heavy mech usage the highest. For Lasers, Armor trumps Speed by a great deal. For Projectiles, Speed trumps Armor.

The fall of the PPC's speed and accuracy forced the rise of the Laser by reducing the average range of combat to medium to short where the PPC is no longer needed and the higher DPS/payload ton of the Laser can dominate.

Suggestion: Better long range options will challenge Laser dominance and force players to, perhaps, not boat them. Light mechs get more deflection defense chances when not facing Laser-Boats, but Light mechs usually carry Lasers so nerfing lasers outright wouldn't help as much as directly challenging Laser dominance.

Just my feedback.

[Astarot]

There just a few problems with what you say. First, a laser's greatest strength, cursor hitting weapon is also it greatest weakness. First, lasers have a duration to apply all damage. Second, any movement of the mouse, be it because of intentional or unintentional results in the damage to spread out, or not apply all of it. Things that can cause movement of the cursor. Screen shake, movement of the enemy mech in relation ship to the movement of your mech. A light mech who knows what they are doing can spread that damage out across their entire mech, or get out of fire before all damage can be applied. The reverse is true for projectile damage, all of their damage is applied as soon as the projectile makes contact with the mech, which is what makes projectiles equally as deadly or even more so to lights, if they get hit by an AC/20 within optimal AC/20 range, then all 20 points of damage is applied to the part that it hits. I have more then once insta killed or at the very least crippled lights because I made a close range shot with an AC/20 and it made contact with the light. We also have long range projectile weapons, AC/2s, AC/5s, Gauss rifles, and in some cases, AC/10s are a good medium range weapon.

Lasers are direct fire, near instant hit weapon that don't require ammo. The cost is of course they produce massive amounts of heat. They have a damage applying duration, which is the same regardless of range.

Projectile weapons are weapons are weapons that take time to travel to their target, They require ammo. However when they make contact, they apply all of the damage to the point they hit instantly. Projectile weapons also produce very little heat. However their downside, is travel time, however, their travel time can be reduced as you closed distance.

long range Missiles weapons are a tad different, they are exactly like projectile weapons, they have ammo, travel time, but they produce high amounts of heat. However their benefit is the fact that they track targets, and will attempt to hit them, even if the target is moving.

essentially what I'm saying is that each type of weapon has it advantage and disadvantage. Meaning that each type of weapon operate totally different for each other. So attempting to force a advantage and disadvantage of different weapon systems will in turn cause the mechs with certain hard point lean to loose their uniqueness of operating just a certain weapon system.

My ballistic mechs have an natural advantage in brawling over lasers because lasers can result in a mech to shut down long before my ballistic mech. Also gauss rifles deal more damage and have a greater max range then ER large lasers have. Not only that, but their velocity (Aka have fast the round travels) Is so fast, that you really don't need to lead the target very much.

I don't understand your complaint, each weapon system has it own unique ability. There are reasons to have lasers, there are reasons to have ballistic, and there are reasons to have missiles and they all perform differently from each other. They are unique, and you are telling me, you want to remove this uniqueness so that all weapon systems are generic, so based on what you said, then I guess we should just remove all weapons and give people just lasers because then they will all operate exactly the same.

[Twilight Fenrir]

I think, the point was more to advocate rolling back some of the nerfs that have been applied. Such as the Gauss Rifle charge, and PPCs slow projectile velocity.

You both have very good points, IMO.

Weapons absolutely have their own flavor, and that shouldn't change. We ARE having a lot of Clan Mechs 'laser vomit' ing, which is prollific. There's nothing wrong with this, but undoing the terrible nerfs mentioned above, would restore parity across the weapons, IMO.

Edited by Twilight Fenrir, 10 April 2015 - 09:17 AM.

[Lightfoot]

Laser duration only makes them weak at long range, anything under 400 meters they don't miss, however, lowering PPCs to 950-1050 meters per second means they usually miss laterally moving targets at 350-400 meters or more so no reason to use them over Lasers because they do less damage for more heat and have a minimum range.

Lasers don't miss Lights and you can track them at medium to close range on a Light fairly easily.

Projectiles miss if the target makes any speed or course change or the pilot aims poorly. Lasers are insta-hit on just a cursor placement. If the pilot can't even place a cursor on the screen they can't aim projectiles either anyway.

Yes, there are reasons to use each weapon, but the attributes of non-Laser weapons have been lowered so much all anyone brings now are heavy laser load-outs or 2xgauss plus lasers. It depends on the mech's hardpoints and now the Quirks. So the balancing is too skewed towards Lasers and they need to be challenged by more than a couple of Quirked-out mechs.

Lasers kill Lights the easiest by just placing the cursor on them. This nullifies their speed defense. Lights are at the lowest use percent ever, prior to the Urbie release, and this coincides with the nerf of the PPC speeds actually. PPCs were the last challenge to Laser range dominance of 400 or less meters, PPCs being accurate at 500-600 meters before the nerf.

Lasers counter speed, always have. MWO's beam duration only makes them inaccurate beyond 400 meters, if, the target moves of course, at least for me and most players shooting back at me.

Anyway, I look at the Light mechs and the fabulous Quirks they are getting, but they are nowhere near as popular as last Summer (before Urbie of course). Is that because of Laser TTK on Lights? Gotta wonder.

[Astarot]

You are saying Lasers are Ez mode for killing lights, when I keep explaining that it not true, I can damn near insta kill lights with an AC/20, or harass them to make them go away with an AC/10, both of these are ballistic weapons and both of these weapons are great for knocking out lights that get at medium to short range.

I think the true reason not many play lights is due to the high skill cap required for light mechs to construct them properly and operate them.

[Kelenas]

Astarot, on 10 April 2015 - 04:41 PM, said:

You are saying Lasers are Ez mode for killing lights, when I keep explaining that it not true, I can damn near insta kill lights with an AC/20, or harass them to make them go away with an AC/10, both of these are ballistic weapons and both of these weapons are great for knocking out lights that get at medium to short range.

I think the true reason not many play lights is due to the high skill cap required for light mechs to construct them properly and operate them.

Lasers are definitely not the greatest weapon for killing lights. Back when I played mostly light mechs I feared the skilled ac20 medium pilot above all others.
Another thing that contributes to less lights around is that you have to work harder for less rewards. Even after all the changes they've made to the reward system you still make less c-bills on average from light games, at least in my experience. The benefits of lights on a team are there, but the fact that many aren't as obvious as the damage and kills heavier mechs put out means you feel like you've done less and feel like you've been rewarded less each time you play a light mech.

[SirNotlag]

If they actually made the flamers usefully that could probably cut down the laser spam by alot, cant fight back if you overheat after every shot.
With the current weapon balance I feel there is a lot of weapons that aren't powerful enough for their draw backs which is why lasers boats are so predominant, they just get so much bang for their buck with decent damage to weight and ease of use, they are also fairly versatile at range and up close.

Personally I feel a lot of the unused weapons should be buffed to provide more variety in the game like the flamer, machine guns, NARC, and IS ssrms.

[darkezero]

Just my 2 cents

• Clans also don't have access to regular PPCs, just the more heat intensive ER PPCs, and since they do the same damage as the IS versions (I don't really count the splash damage as worth it), there's not really a reason to take it over the Large Pulse Laser other than the alpha. 13 damage in just over a second of burn time for 10 heat with no travel time, or 10 damage on contact for 15 heat with travel time.
  
• Clan ACs and UACs are pretty much lasers with travel time (damage over time), ammo requirements, and screen shake instead of bright light and high heat production.
  
• Some of the IS mechs have quirks that give them a better laser-vomit build than the general Clan mech.
  
• And finally, those with the higher the ping are more likely to use lasers as lasers are more likely to hit something rather than nothing at all due to hitscan with lag.

all in all, I wouldnt call it EZ mode, just the current meta due to the way PGI nerfs and buffs various things